Washington: Pressing China to open dialogue with the Dalai Lama "for a peaceful outcome" to the Tibet issue, influential Democrat Nancy Pelosi has demanded that Beijing immediately allow independent outside monitors to review the situation in the riot-scarred Himalayan region.

"I myself am personally calling once again on the Chinese government to join, to sustain negotiations with His Holiness for a peaceful outcome to what is happening in Tibet for their autonomy, to immediately have independent outside monitors to review what happened in Tibet," said the Speaker of the House of Representatives who drew Beijing s ire for meeting the Dalai Lama during a visit to India last month.

Pelosi said the trip was planned before March 10 when the most vicious anti-Chinese demonstrations in two decades erupted in Lhasa.

"We planned to visit His Holiness the Dalai Lama, to pay our respects to him, to join in his ongoing call for negotiations with the Chinese government for autonomy for Tibet," she said.

"Again, as the fate would have it, on March 10,the 49th anniversary of the Chinese driving His Holiness the Dalai Lama out of China, the protests there were met by a crackdown of the Chinese government, so we were there at a time when again, it was our fate to be there, and our fate to help," Pelosi said.
Source : PTI